October 02, 2024
Bill Streicher/Imagn Images
Tyrese Maxey will lead the Sixers' guard rotation as he enters his fifth NBA season.
The Sixers' five-day training camp period in The Bahamas has begun. Now that we have photo, video and written evidence that the basketball team does exist, we can speculate about how it will all look when the regular season opens in just a few weeks.
With that in mind, let's get to your questions in our weekly Sixers mailbag!
Sixers player previews: Critical questions and predictions for each member of the 2024-25 roster
From @sether81: How do you see the playing time distribution between Eric Gordon, Kyle Lowry, Reggie Jackson and Jared McCain?
Lowry came back to play a rather important role for this team. I would be very surprised if he did not average the most minutes per game of any reserve guard on the Sixers for at least the first significant handful of games. Sixers head coach Nick Nurse confirmed at Media Day on Monday that while the team will not ask Lowry for as much as they did last season — when De'Anthony Melton's back injury forced him into a larger role than expected — he will be a crucial cog in Nurse's rotation.
Gordon appears to be locked into Nurse's initial rotation as well. He spoke at length about the value of adding quality three-point shooters, and Gordon is one of the most accomplished long-range snipers in recent NBA history. On a team built around Joel Embiid, Tyrese Maxey and Paul George, having accurate and willing spot-up shooters is a must. Gordon is very accurate and even more willing.
McCain's clearest path to consistent minutes likely involves Gordon missing time or severely underwhelming. McCain is sized like a traditional ball-handler, but as things stand now he is exclusively an off-ball weapon at the NBA level. McCain is going to enter his first NBA game as an excellent three-point shooter, but his ability to create for himself or others off the dribble will be extremely limited. Gordon is not the secondary creator he once was; it is hard to imagine the veteran and rookie both being part of Nurse's rotation given their similar offensive profiles.
If a guard who is not currently a lock to be in the rotation does break into Nurse's second unit, the favorite would be Jackson, who provides ball-handling, stable doses of shot creation and satisfactory spot-up shooting. Jackson is a weak link on the defensive end of the floor despite a 7-foot wingspan that enables him to occasionally make unique plays and his shot selection tends to veer off course at times. If Jackson does end up seeing consistent playing time for the Sixers, a slight adjustment of his shot diet to include fewer long two-point attempts would go a long way.
There is one other reason Nurse might be inclined to give Jackson some additional run when he can...
From @bdpollack: How will Tyrese Maxey's minutes be split as far as minutes at the point and minutes off the ball?
It became evident early on last season that, when possible, Nurse likes to use lineups that include multiple credible ball-handlers — even if it means those units lack traditional size on the defensive end of the floor. His starting lineup for the entirety of the postseason featured Maxey and Lowry; even Cam Payne started eight times in the regular season.
There are plenty of benefits to this strategy. Having multiple players easily capable of initiating an offensive possession or leading the team in transition is crucial — not only does it make it easier to score, but it adds a sense of unpredictability to a team's offense. Nurse clearly places significant value in that — stylistic diversity is one of the core tenants of his coaching style.
But given this specific team's personnel, there are other reasons, too — and the most important one is the one you are alluding to. Maxey has made massive strides in recent years — last year in particular — operating as a true point guard. He will never be a pass-first player and he will never lead the league in assists, but he has gone from a combo guard focused on carving out scoring opportunities for himself to somewhat of a floor general who knows how to mix in looks for his teammates in an effort to keep everybody involved.
With all of that being said, Maxey is far better at putting the ball in the basket than he is at enabling other people to do it. Even as Nurse helped Maxey transition into being a starting point guard on a nightly basis, he ensured the young guard would see ample time focusing on scoring. Sometimes that meant giving Maxey the ball in units otherwise starved for scoring threats, but sometimes it just meant pairing him with someone like Lowry or Payne who could set him up in his preferred spots on the floor.
Because he will be the team's starting point guard, most of Maxey's minutes will come as a creator. But this is where Lowry's presence once again looms large — having a player who can share the backcourt with Maxey, operating as a point guard on offense while being able to guard twos and threes is incredibly valuable. With Lowry on board, Nurse is guaranteed to be able to slide Maxey to an off-ball role for some amount of time each night. Jackson proving to be a quality option would make that even easier for Nurse.
From @epark88: I can't seem to shake the angst of the Sixers signing a major FA from a conference rival who then immediately goes bust. How is the Caleb Martin signing different? What will prevent him from becoming Al Horford 2.0?
Well, I'll answer this as quickly as I can before expanding a bit: Martin will not become Al Horford 2.0 because he is not a center who signed a nine-figure contract to team with another center, a non-shooting power forward who masquerades as a point guard and Tobias Harris.
On a more serious note, it is understandable to be nervous about Martin's production dropping off in Philadelphia in that he would not be the first player to decline after leaving the Miami Heat. But it's important to remember that the Sixers are not going to ask Martin to do much he has not proven he is capable of doing in the past.
During his time in Miami, Martin became an established, starting-caliber wing by playing tenacious defense across multiple positions, being a serviceable spot-up three-point shooter and occasionally chipping in with some secondary scoring. That is just about his exact job description with the Sixers — in fact, he will be asked to score less than he was on a Miami team which often lacked perimeter creation behind former Sixer Jimmy Butler.
The only real path to Martin's four-year deal with the Sixers aging poorly — the deal is only worth between $35 million and $40 million in all, depending on certain incentives — is him becoming a considerably-below-average three-point shooter. That is theoretically possible, but his 36.8 three-point percentage during his three years in Miami — on modest volume — indicates he will at least remain competent there.
There could be speed bumps for Martin as he transitions to a new organization with an unfamiliar coaching staff and group of teammates. His defensive style has at times clashed with Nurse's ideals for how wings should operate. But none of the issues that appear on the surface are ones that cannot be smoothed out over time.
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